can people really retrieve deleted IMs and email from your computer?

Question

I mean....if you dont save your IMs and if your email is deleted ...how do people like detectives retrieve it...so then how can i permantly remove it? I have a computer i want to give someone but i want to make sure any emails or IMS cant be retrieved later

Answer 1

Yes, even if you delete the file, its data is still on the disk and only its location is removed from the directory. Similarly IM files are in temporary locations.

If you are very particular of protecting your data, take out the hard disk and install a new hard disk. The hard disk which you take out can be fitted in a new desktop PC of yours. Alternatively, there are software to overwrite the harddisk with some gibberish so that the original data is irreparably lost.

Answer 2

With the right tools, yes. Email for certain, I'm not so sure about IM's.

2nd Edit:

Now that I understand what you want, you can boot your PC to an old windows 98 boot disk, or a linux boot CD, and run FDISK to remove all the partitions. This will remove all files beyond normal recovery, although if someone were willing to spend enough money (thousands or 10s of thousands) they could probably have most of the data recovered.

However FDISK will do the trick if you are just giving your PC to a friend. If you are really concerned about this, try the link below for some free software that should delete any files beyond non-government recovery.

Answer 3

Your complicated force incorporates particularly 2 significant issues... a itemizing of your data (called the report table), which incorporates the place each and all the information for stated report is placed, and, of course, the information of the report itself. once you delete a report and empty the recycle bin, all that occurs is a flag is desperate interior the report table that tells the report device that stated area is now no longer reserved... meaning the two that area and the report table get admission to would be overwritten if needed. So the suitable wager is to maintain the workstation working interior the state it became in while the report became by possibility "deleted"... do no longer close any apps, start up new ones, or do any internet surfing... particularly, attempt to no longer use the workstation for something in any respect. although, in case you're downloading something (like with a P2P app, for example) you may wish to cancel the downloads. particularly, you opt to shrink the probabilities of that information getting overwritten. Then, on yet another device, discover and obtain an undelete utility which will run from a floppy or CD-ROM and use that to accomplish an undelete. you may result with a set of rubbish, and it is complicated to discover, yet odds are you will discover it. although, as others have stated, there won't be the thank you to reuse it on your digital mail client, on the grounds that some putting someplace would now no longer element to that report. you may nonetheless be waiting to verify it using a text textile editor or hex viewer, yet, returned, it would desire to be complicated to verify or in all possibility encrypted (reckoning on your digital mail utility.) besides, stable success with that =)